Ancient, medieval, Islamic and world history -- comments, resources and discussion.

Wednesday, March 01, 2017

Thomas Jefferson --- Revolutionary, by Kevin R.C. Gutzman

Americans have made quite a cult of the Founding Fathers,
the political and military leaders who led the Atlantic colonies to throw off
British rule – a remarkable achievement that often is used to support the
similar idea of American exceptionalism: that America is a country unlike any
other, thanks in large part to the wise choices made by the equally exceptional
Fathers.

It is hard to avoid the conclusion that at least some of the
Fathers were pretty amazing. George Washington, for instance, had exactly the
aristocratic character that was needed to lead a new republic in the 18th
century. But his ability to charm and impress his contemporaries is now
entirely mysterious to us. If he showed
up in modern America he would have no hope of a political career. It's hard to imagine what kind of role he
could find in public affairs.
Aristocratic, eccentric rich guy, perhaps a shadowy investor in cutting
edge tech firms?

An amazing FF that we can partially understand is Thomas
Jefferson. He gets credit for a wide
selection of contributions to the American character and American institutions
over more than 50 years of public life.
We appreciate and praise his constructive efforts, the importance of
which is pretty obvious (freedom of religion); what we wonder is how he
addressed all of those issues.

Kevin Gutzman may not have an answer to this question, but
he gives a pretty good analysis of what he considers Jefferson's key
achievements. This is not a full biography
– there are good biographies and they are massive –it's a portrait. Gutzman compares Jefferson to a pointillist
painter who created a political philosophy by dealing with one issue at a
time. Gutzman himself has a pointillist
approach in describing Jefferson, and it works for him.

Gutzman identifies five areas that Jefferson dealt with in
the course of his career: Federalism (his opposition to centralized
power), Freedom of Conscience (his
opposition to established churches),
Colonization (what might be better called Deportation, meaning the elimination of
racial conflict by eliminating the slaves), Assimilation (of the Native
population) and "Mr. Jefferson's University" (the most important
piece in Jefferson's desire for public education). Put those 5 issues together and you find
yourself treading surprisingly familiar paths through a political landscape
that maybe has changed less in the past 200+ years than we might first think. I am particularly thinking of the issue of
"federalism," meaning not centralism (as it does in Canada) but quite
the opposite, which Jefferson supported because he believed in the legitimacy
of the separate states, with their differing institutions and
"values" as people say today.

One issue that Gutzman says little about is Jefferson's relationship
with his slave mistress, Sally Hemmings.
It's a tough question for an alumnus of Jefferson's own university, but
I do have to wonder if she would have been deported, if colonization of slaves
and ex-slaves had ever taken place. Is
this so ridiculous a question? I think
this is just one way that the contradictions of the Founding Fathers' position can
be expressed.

So: a book of
reasonable length, well-written, with the power to inspire serious
contemplation about both Jefferson's
time and America's present.